Benny Jay: A Team Win

It’s Friday night, and I’m just about the happiest man in America, cause the Bulls are on free TV, as in no cable, which means that even I get to watch `em….

Good game, too. Neck and Neck with Washington into the third quarter.  Best of all, Derrick Rose is lighting it up for the Bulls.

Did I tell you I love Derrick Rose?

Well, it’s true. I’ve been watching him play basketball since his grammar school days at Beasley elementary right here in Chicago at 52nd and State. It’s almost like I coached him myself….

I’ve got company for the game. My older daughter and her friends — Ryan, Anika and Nora. Even my wife makes an appearance.

Don’t want to listen to the play-by-play so I’ve got the TV sound down, and Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes on the stereo. It’s in honor of Teddy Pendergrass, who passed away the other day.

Did I tell you I once saw Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes?

Well, I did. Back in the early `80s at Cross Currents, a cozy little club on the north side of town. By then, Teddy had gone off on his own, but they had a front man who sounded just like him. They sang all their hits. Closed with Wake up Everybody, which happens to be playing on the stereo right now.

“Wake up, everybody, no more sleepin’ in bed….”

It’s still one of the greatest songs ever written.

“No more backward thinkin’ — time for thinkin’ ahead….”

Just then, Hinrich — good ol’ Captain Kirk himself — hits a jump shot to put the Bulls up by four….

“The world has change so very much from what it used to be….”

I’m doing this dance I invented — based on the Funky Chicken….

“There is so much hatred, war and poverty….”

My wife leaves the couch.

I watch her go. “Where you going?” I ask.

“To the computer,” she says.

“But the Bulls were winning with you on the couch….”

She smiles like she does when she’s stopped listening to the dumber things I say.

Oh, no — I have this sense of pending doom. As if my wife’s departure from the couch has ignited some cosmic chain of reaction that will hurt the Bulls.

Sure enough, Washington scores a bunch of points in a hurry.

“Okay,” I say to my wife. “I’m not blaming you, but the Bulls were up by four when you left the couch and now they’re down seven….”

She looks up from the computer. “Do you want me to come back to the couch?” she asks.

“Well, yeah,” I say.

“Are you one of those people who are superstitious?” asks Anika.

“Oh, I know people like that,” says Ryan….

“All I’m saying – is that when she was on the couch the Bulls were winning. And since she left the coach they’re losing. It may be just a coincidence, but why take the chance?”

My wife sighs, and returns to the couch. I think this falls under the category of worse in the old wedding-oath clause of for better or worse….

Sure enough, the Bulls surge back. The game goes into two overtimes! It’s tied with ten seconds left and Derrick’s got the ball. He fakes left, turns right, jumps, hangs in the air and throws up a shot that….

Goes in!

Bulls win! Bulls win!

Every one’s whooping it up. I’m on my feet doing the funky chicken, yelling: “Dee Rose! Dee Rose!”

When the jubilation settles, my wife asks: “Can I go back to the computer?”

“Yes,” I say. “You did a great job. You were sensational. Derrick did his part and you did your part — it was a total team win. They couldn’t have won it without you.”

Then I start singing: “The world won’t get no better, if we just let it be — we gotta change it, yeah, just you and me….”

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